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The week's question
In March 2025, in the thread "Re: OT, out", Umm asked the members: "Do you think it is because America is made up of magical soil that makes businesses based in America magically profitable?" This week it is put to everyone again. The button below opens the small thread re-asking it - read what others have said so far, then give your own answer as an ordinary reply.
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Author: PucksFool ✧✺  😊 😞
Number: of 86252 
Subject: Wage suppression in 10 charts
Date: 10/04/26 6:45 PM
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epi.org - Wage suppression in charts

Wages for typical workers have been largely suppressed since the 1970s. The 10 charts below tell that story.
In the following 10 charts, we outline the historical context of workers’ wage trajectories since the 1970s. For most of those years, wages for the majority of workers were essentially stagnant. Two periods, the late 1990s and the last decade, saw decent wage growth, which kept cumulative wage growth since 1979 well above zero. But those years were the exception, not the norm. More importantly, even with those two periods, wages for typical workers lagged far behind productivity growth—meaning there was the potential for wages to rise far faster than they did. Had workers’ wages kept up with productivity, their annual earnings would have been roughly $30,000 higher.

Income
1. The cost of inequality to middle-class households
2. Income inequality is driven by unbalanced power in labor markets

Wages
3. Wage suppression boosted profits
4. Highly paid corporate managers and professionals benefited the most from wage suppression
5. Since 1979, middle-wage workers only saw short-lived real wage growth during tightening labor markets
6. Wage suppression was not driven by increased benefits

Policy
7. CEO pay grabs a larger share of wages
8. Tolerating excess unemployment has been deeply damaging for wage growth
9. The federal minimum wage no longer lifts wages
10. The assault on collective bargaining hurts all workers
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This community has written 86,214 posts about US Policy. The article-length ones it recommended most:
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